Editorial: Complaint misguided

The region’s police forces are facing a complaint for Canada Day liquor searches, but allegations they broke the law seem misguided.

A complaint letter sent last week by the B.C. Civil Liberties Union lashed out at area police forces. “Police forces in Canada do not have the legal authority to initiate random or mandatory searches such as those that occurred in Victoria,” it read.

Nor, it argues, can police seize property without legal authority. Of course alcohol can’t be consumed in public, the complaint allows, but nothing prevents adults from carrying it in closed containers. The complaint names all of the region’s police forces, but Victoria has borne the burden of defending the searches.

The department pointed to section 67 of B.C.’s Liquor Control and Licensing Act, saying it gives them the legal authority to do the searches. The language in the Act is pretty unequivocal. Police officers have the right to search for alcohol when they have “reasonable and probable grounds ... liquor is, anywhere or on anyone, unlawfully possessed or kept, or possessed or kept for unlawful purposes.”

It continues, giving officers the power to “seize and remove liquor found and the packages in which it is kept,” regardless of whether those packages are open or sealed.

Victoria police -- with a total force of 220 officers -- had to borrow from Saanich and Oak Bay and dig into their volunteer reserve corps to muster the 170 bodies on duty July 1. Those 170 officers were tasked with maintaining order and protecting an estimated crowd of 50,000. That’s a very thin blue line.

Experience shows that trouble starts with a handful of people who have been drinking and usually bring their booze with them.

Random police searches would indeed represent a troubling erosion of civil liberties. We believe the searches conducted on Canada Day were reasonable and targeted.

If the BCCLA has a beef with policy, it should be with the terms of Liquor Act, not police acting in accordance with it.